The moment that would eventually divide neighbors in a small Ontario town, bring in lawyers and prompt one family to put their home up for sale seemed innocent enough at the time: A poke check during a peewee hockey practice.

Just over two years later, the banality of that incident has turned into a dispute that is keeping 13-year-old Cody Giroux from playing the game he loves while parents, coaches and lawyers battle around him over allegations of harassment, bullying and breach of responsibility.

The succession of events that led to this point provide testament to just how high the stakes can be with hockey in Canada — even among peewee players.

Giroux was 10 years old two seasons ago, lacing up for a game near his home in Warren, Ont. — between Sudbury and North Bay — when his teammate’s father stormed into the dressing room.

The father — Steven Olsen — was upset that his son had been hit in the ankle during a team practice a couple of days earlier by one of the other boys. A well known figure in town, Olsen is hailed by some as a tireless volunteer for kid’s hockey, while others describe a more difficult individual.

“He started speaking loud and telling everyone not to touch his kid,” Cody said. “My dad was the coach and he was trying to get him out of the room so they could discuss it but (Olsen) kept saying, ‘No, no, no, I’m not done.’ We were all in shock.”

A formal appeal submission now before the Ontario Hockey Federation alleges Olsen’s address to the room of young boys ended with this looming promise to a boy named Zak who inadvertently caused the ankle mishap: “Don’t worry, your turn will come.”

Olsen declined repeated requests for comment.

Lingering tensions from that day were rekindled this fall when Olsen was named coach of the Markstay-Warren Wolves team where Cody, now 13, was supposed to play.

The teen says he doesn’t want to play for Olsen. “I’m scared that even if I do something by accident to (Olsen’s son), he’ll come after me,” Cody said in a telephone interview. “I’m terrified of what could happen.”

A Giroux family application to the local hockey association for a release that would allow Cody to play elsewhere was denied.

The Northern Ontario Hockey Association denied a subsequent request for Cody’s release in a hearing on October 24, ruling that it would be “for the betterment of the Bantam team” for Giroux to remain with the club, the ruling reads. “By releasing players from the Bantam Team it would mean the possibility of folding the team due to lack of players.”

Association officials declined repeated requests for an interview, eventually referring questions to lawyer Joseph Kennedy, who also declined comment.

Pierre Frappier, a town councilor and father of the boy who was the target of Olsen in the locker room two years ago, says his town is “split” on Olsen.

“A lot of people are (asking) ‘why is he there?’ and ‘why is the (local hockey) association backing him so much?’ But he organizes hockey tournaments for kids so people are supporting him. To say he’s an upstanding citizen and everybody loves him, I can’t say that.”

Frappier’s own view is influenced by what he saw standing in the locker room that day two years ago.

“(Olsen) walked into the changing room and walked straight to me and (Cody’s father Eric) and said, ‘I have a problem here. It seems there’s a kid here who likes to use his stick. My kid’s shins are all bruised up.’”

Frappier says his son, a goalie on the team practicing poke checks, did let his stick get high on Olsen’s son. He demanded his son apologize and considered the matter closed.

“But (Olsen) kept going and going to the point where my son was 11 years old, he had a nervous smile on his face and (Olsen) said, ‘You think that’s funny, your turn will come,’” Frappier said in a phone interview. “There was anger in his voice.”

Frappier’s son did receive a release from the local hockey association to play in a neighboring town this year, in part to avoid playing for Olsen. Because the boy is a goaltender — and there were two other goalies available to the team — the permission was more easily granted.

Frappier says he regrets Cody has had to endure so much turmoil.

“I think it is extraordinary measures to go through for a 13-year-old kid to play house league. The association says if they give him a release they won’t have a team. Well, they have a team now without him so that’s bogus. There has to be some other reason.”

The league’s decision to deny Cody a chance to play elsewhere has not only kept the boy off the ice. When the Giroux family looks across the street from their home, they see Olsen’s house. Just to the right is the home of Mark Marois, president of the local minor hockey association which denied Cody’s request for a release.

Marois also declined repeated requests for comment.

The clearest symbol of the heightening conflict is posted on the Giroux family’s front lawn: A “For Sale” sign.

It’s a decision the family reached as a consequence of the dispute. They’re also considering moving Cody to a different school.

“It’s a small town,” said Cody’s mother Sylvianne. “Hockey is all there is here.”

In a 15-page submission, the family alleges Olsen has a “history of violence.”

Only weeks after the locker room incident, Olsen was playing in a family hockey tournament designed to raise funds for the local hockey association.

The friendly tournament allegedly turned ugly when Olsen approached a referee and “physically assaulted him and punched him in the head,” reads the family’s appeal to the OHF, obtained by the Star. “The Markstay Association simply suspended Olsen from participating in that fundraising tournament for two years.”

The referee involved, who declined to be interviewed, supplied the Giroux family with a written statement last month saying he was “punched in the head” and “had many issues with Steven Olsen and his teammates.”

Others in Warren paint a different portrait of Olsen.

In July, he was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for volunteerism with the Warren and District Lions Club and minor hockey.

“With what he gives back to the community, he’s respected,” said town mayor Sonja Flynn. “He knows the needs of the municipality and he gets involved. . . . When I see things like this going on, it’s sad.”

Cody’s father Eric Giroux, coach of the team two years ago when Olsen entered the locker room, says he asked Olsen to stop addressing the boys “five or six times.” Olsen ignored him, he says.

With word of the family’s decision to launch a high-profile appeal against neighbors, the elder Giroux says he’s being shunned in the community where he has raised his family over the past 15 years.

Some neighbors avoid eye contact, he says. And he’s removed himself from the local men’s hockey league in order to avoid conflict on the ice or in the locker room.

The family’s appeal submission alleges the association’s refusal to let Cody play elsewhere is “contrary to the many rules, policies and procedures regarding bullying, abuse, violence and harassment of children along with Ontario laws and legislation regarding the protection of children and mandating decisions in their best interests.”

Cody describes his feelings this way: “I don’t want to talk to anyone or go anywhere to an arena or watch my sister play. I cry sometimes. At school, they always talk about hockey and it makes me pretty sad.”

Michael Mazzuca, the Toronto lawyer representing the Giroux family, says the Markstay-Warren Minor Hockey Association has exhibited “a total lack of fairness” in dealing with the family’s request for a transfer to another team.

“Decision makers are mandated to make decisions in the best interests of children and to take all risks to avoid any chance of hindrance to their safety or personal development.”

Those duties were neglected in this case, he says.

In response to the Giroux appeal, the OHF and NOHA have ordered a fact-finder to conduct an investigation into the case. The problem is that Cody can’t play anywhere except for Olsen’s team until the investigation is resolved. Mazzuca wants the association to release Cody at the same time as conducting the investigation.

“We’re not going to deal with an appeal based on harassment or abuse without an investigation into harassment or abuse. That is a situation where it impacts not just one child but other children in the organization.”

The complaint is also unique because it centres on a two-year-old incident that should have been more vigorously pursued at the time, says McKee.

“(Eric) was a coach himself at the time and didn’t follow up to make sure it was dealt with properly either. It’s tough for him to blame us when he didn’t report it to us until he wants a release.”

Eric Giroux says he did report the incident to the president of the association at the time and assumed it would be properly investigated.

In a neatly-handwritten summary of events Cody wrote earlier this month, the teen ends with a paragraph explaining why his separation from the game has been so difficult.

“I love hockey and I want to play,” he writes. “Right now it is hard for me to even to go a rink or play hockey at school because I am not playing and do not want to play for Mr. Olsen.”

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